When Edgar reveals, first thing in the morning while making breakfast for himself, that he already knows Gretchen has been sneaking out in the middle of the night, I was more surprised that he would be preparing his own food than that he was completely up to speed on Gretchen’s nocturnal walkabouts. I can’t decide if that is something that should make me feel really good about Edgar, or really bad, or maybe just something in between? Let’s hold on to the good there: He’s finally ready to let love into his life again! Well, not again, obviously, because he’s never had love in his life before. So, for the first time. Either way, great news for Edgar! No more texts from Lindsay that are like, “Yo girl, wanna get brunch?â€
Edgar’s romantic competition is virtually nonexistent because Dorothy’s whole world is obnoxious comedy bros. Dorothy can’t believe she met a guy who would just say to her, point blank, “I think you’re funny and cute and I’d like to take you on a date with me.†She’s used to improv tools who have, like, one meeting with Bob Odenkirk and no longer think they’re repulsive trolls. Edgar tells Dorothy to be honest about her feelings and inadvertently breaks up Hey, Put That Down, Brian, but she seems fine with it for now. Edgar makes me want to just type in sparkly heart emoji. Okay, I’m worried about him again.
Jimmy’s starter attempt to get Gretchen to reveal some kind of guilt or telltale weirdness falls very flat. He tells her she looks tired. Dude, never say that to a woman! I mean, never say that to anyone, honestly, it’s just not that nice a thing to say. Gretchen responds in kind: “Cool, thanks. Your dick is a weird color. Catch up again tomorrow?â€
Lindsay, as we may have suspected, has approximately zero life skills. She stares dazed at her bread that won’t turn itself into toast. She hasn’t paid any of her bills. She doesn’t know how a person is supposed to know they have to put oil in their car. With no power — not, like, in a romantic or sexual way; literally, she didn’t pay the electricity bill, and now her house has no power — she feels “like a frontierswoman. I’m like Reese Witherspoon in that commercial for backpacks.†Later we watch her discover the joys of walking for what appears to be the very first time. She goes in a circle. She’s … she’s not doing so hot, you guys.
Why are we learning this? Jimmy and Lindsay are hanging out. Briefly. So Jimmy can find out if Lindsay has any dirt on Gretchen’s late-night whereabouts. Gretch, very casually, is all, “She probably has a side bitch,†which of course means Jimmy snoops, and of course means he finds Gretchen’s burner phone. Devoted viewers of this program and/or attentive readers of these recaps will remember this phone as the God phone Sam gave Gretchen as a punishment for being a sleepy bitch. But to Jimmy, it all looks very suspicious. His texts from Sam — or, to Jimmy’s mind, a mystery side bitch — do little to assuage his fears.
Jimmy, in an attempt to bring Gretchen and her presumed side bitch under one roof and expose their adultery, takes Gretchen to Aecht Eau, the worst name for the worst bar. A bar that only serves water. “We’ve separated the hydrogen molecules and infused them with lavender.†I’m sorry, what?
While there, we run into red herring Ty, that douchey director Gretchen used to kinda-sorta date. Gretchen’s reaction to him is perhaps my favorite line of the episode, for both its truth and its simplicity: “Why are you …?â€
Meanwhile, Jimmy puts it together that he’s been texting Sam, and that Sam would never screw Gretchen — “Hell no! Bitch eats floor candy.†— and is back at sleuthing square one, which can only mean one thing: time for his fake mustache.
But this very funny visual leads to a very unfunny one: Jimmy follows Gretchen and finds that she is sitting at a scenic overlook, in her car, sobbing. She takes her burner phone because she likes to play Snake while she cries. “That’s a classic game,†Jimmy says, and I can’t argue with that real talk, but still, is Jimmy really nonplussed by her zero-dark-thirty jaunts to a quiet, desolate view where all she does is bawl? He has a little spring in his step on his way back to his car like he thinks everything is fine. If only.
The worst: It’s a close call between Ty, who was just in Vegas with Adam Levine and Swaggy P talking about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and the bar in which we meet Ty, Aecht Eau. But ultimately, I come down on the side of the bar. Because as terrible as Ty is, how terrible does a place have to be to attract Ty, and then to not even serve alcohol so that everyone else who is there in the presence of Ty has nothing but “the finest artisanal water from around the globe†to help them through the struggle?
Runners-up: Getting an 800 on your SATs, using the remaining time of your group-therapy session for a fake-turned-real feud to talk about your parents’ divorce, Vernon abbreviation traditional to “tradish.â€
A few good things: Sam tweeting an old photo of Shitstain in his scoliosis brace, Tall Nathan’s two strong lesbian moms, Vernon telling Lindsay that she’s a good friend who makes people happy, those restrictions on Everest that will hopefully cut down on human waste pollution.